My Last Moments
by Bookkbaby
Summary: SPOLIERS manga chapter 393 Itachi POV. '"Your eyes belong to me now." I say, exhausted and lying through my teeth.'


Warnings: Character death (though it's canon...), spoilers for chapters 393+.

A/N: I'm not very used to writing Itachi - he was never a favorite character of mine until recently, but I think I got his character about right. This was done in Itachi's POV (I rarely do first-person POV).

My Last Moments

"Your eyes belong to me now." I say, exhausted and lying through my teeth. These are not the most difficult words I have said to you. I know I have said worse things, far worse, but these will be some of my last words to you.

My lungs are burning, chest constricted. I'm dying, ototo.

I'm happy. You've grown strong. I've removed that damned cursed seal. Orochimaru no longer has a hold on you.

"I'll take them slowly... I want to savor this."

I can see your fear, Sasuke. You're terrified that I will indeed take your eyes, that the illusion I showed you at the beginning of the fight will become reality. The desire to comfort you wells up beside the pain in my chest, but I've played this part for too long to let it all collapse now. You can never know what I've done or who ordered the slaughter of our clan.

I want you to live and protect Konoha as I did. Even if you can't find it in yourself to protect our home, you must live.

Even if it hasn't seemed like it to you, ototo, I never stopped being your brother.

My footsteps are unsteady as I walk - the Susano'o technique took more out of me than I had thought, and my time was already short. Even so, it had to be done. You're free now, Sasuke.

The pain in my lungs peaks - I can't stop it. My chest is tight, my heart struggling on for a few more feeble beats.

I cough, body trying to rid my lungs of the blood leaking into those vital organs. The coughs wrack my body, coming from the very depths of my lungs, but I can't stop now. Even as I collapse to my knees, coughing and spitting out the blood as it enters my mouth, I can't stop.

I push myself to my feet, unsteady and weak as my legs are I believe they will support me for a few more minutes.

A few more minutes is all I need.

The kunai with exploding tags you throw doesn't reach me. I won't let it, not when the situation has turned this critical. I need to get to you before my body gives out, before my heart and lungs stop.

You're afraid. I can see it in your eyes, your body language as you back away from me. We're both out of chakra, drained to nothing but the remnants of energy needed to keep our bodies working.

I can't tell you how much this hurts, ototo. There is nothing more important to me in this world than you Sasuke - I would go to such lengths for no one else. Not even Konoha.

The emotional pain almost dwarfs the physical - or maybe it does, they're so entwined I can no longer tell.

In my last moments, all I see are your eyes. I see your hate, your terror, the feeling of betrayal. I can't see well - the use of the Mangekyo Sharingan and the blood loss have seen to that, but I can picture your face clearly. I see the delight in your eyes when I'd come home from the Ninja Academy, all those years ago. I see disbelief and fear mix when you come home to find me as I killed our mother and father. I see betrayal when I tell you that I was only testing myself.

I see the hate when I cornered that Kyuubi boy in the hallway of the inn and you found us. I see the hate when you came to me today and found me in this abandoned compound.

"Fuck you!" you shout.

I see your anger, now, as you summon kunai and explosives to throw at me.

They don't reach me. I can't die yet. I'm almost to you, almost within touching distance.

I know I worked hard to get to this moment, playing my role carefully so that you would loathe me and grow strong enough to survive in this world. Even though I know I wanted this, part of me wishes that my role hadn't been played so well, that you had found out about the truth and had come to me today to ask me to travel with your group, be a family again. It hurts and if I hadn't taken care to repress my emotions all these years I'd be crying.

I hope you never find out what really happened the night I killed our clan. If you find out that all I did was for you, would you mourn my death? Lament the fact that it was you who killed me? I don't want you to feel that pain. You mourned for our clan when you were younger. I don't want you to mourn for me.

Continue hating me. Continue believing I was a heartless bastard who never truly felt anything for any of his family, but let my death serve as your ticket back into Konoha. Let them welcome you with open arms for killing the 'Clan-Slayer'.

One last charade, and then this play is finished, little brother. The curtain will close on my death.

"My eyes... my..." I manage to say, struggling to breathe as blood slowly fills my lungs. I reach for you.

You draw your sword, leaping at me.

"DIE!" Your voice is filled with so much honest loathing it cuts a new wound in me, on the inside where you won't see the scar.

If that blade lands, I'll die before I fulfill my personal mission.

I knock you back and watch emotionlessly as you hit the ground.

Forgive me, ototo.

Your back is to the wall now, Sasuke. You have no where left to run, and you know it. You're shaking.

Just in time. My brain is fogged and legs and lungs weaker than ever. I have maybe a minute left. My vision's failing, fading into a deeper darkness than ever before.

Only determination keeps me moving forward.

I reach for you - not for your eyes, as you suspect, but for your forehead. Remember when I used to poke your forehead and promise that we'd play together later? You'd get so irritated with me, rubbing the mark I left on your face and complaining that it was always 'maybe next time' and never 'right now'.

Do you remember that?

I can't think - time is running together, mixing the past with the present and now I can't remember when or what I am supposed to be anymore.

These are my final moments. Maybe it's that fact or maybe it's because I can't think straight, but I open my mouth and speak. Not as Uchiha Itachi, the cold-hearted clan slayer, but as your nii-san. For these few moments, I'm transported back in time to when you would look forward to seeing me and your eyes would widen in delight when I came home from school. To days when I would take you into the Uchiha compound's forest and we would play - hide-and-go-seek, playing at being ninja, tag, whatever it was you felt like playing.

My vision is gone, but I can make out your blurred outline against the rock wall and in my mind I still see your happy smile.

All those 'next time's I promised you... where did time go?

"I'm sorry, Sasuke. There won't be a next time." I tell you. I can feel the muscles in my face stretch into a smile, an expression I haven't worn since before I betrayed our clan and left Konoha. I haven't smiled since the last time we played together.

My hand finally makes contact - that's all I can feel. I can no longer feel my legs or my left arm, only my right hand. My head feels light but heavy, weighing my body down as my brain floats in a fog.

It's just like old times, Sasuke, when I'd prod your forehead and you'd pout. Except this time there is no pout, only shock.

You're still my darling little brother.

With the very last bits of my energy, I transfer all the techniques - Mangekyo, Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi - into you. Your eyes will be your most powerful weapons.

Please use my techniques well. Everything I did, I did for you, but this is the end.

My hand, slick with blood, slides down your face. I can't hold my body up.

I can feel Susano'o dissipating around us. I can't hold that technique anymore, though it hardly matters. It accomplished its purpose.

I think I'm falling. I think my head strikes something, but I can't be sure. Nothing seems to matter - I gave you power, you're free from Orochimaru's taint, and Konoha will hopefully welcome you back with open arms for killing me.

The world is wonderful.

My lungs, my heart... stop.

Goodbye, little brother.

I love you.

End

A/N: I hope you enjoyed it - well, if 'enjoy' is the right word. I tried to keep Itachi IC and hope I did okay. Drop me a line, please!


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